Case Study on Segway

Background: Segway LLC is a company created by Dean Kamen in 2002 to manufacture and market the Segway Human Transporter. The SHT is a personal transport vehicle held upright by gyroscope technology. It is for use on and off-road, for recreation and commuting, by police departments and for government/military uses. Some of the SHT’s weaknesses include the $100 million development price tag and its high selling cost of over $4,500. A third weakness for the SHT is that Segway has not created enough physical locations where consumers can test drive and buy a machine. A final weakness is the lack of corporate/front office competence shown by Dean Kamen. The strengths of the SHT include its versatility of application. Segway has been shown to be valuable to police in patrolling duties and military with bomb disposal vehicles. The SHT also has shows strength in its financial backing. Mr. Kamen has been able to call on investors at any time to help financially when Segway has fallen short of its sales forecasts for the SHT. Segway has many opportunities on the horizon. If it makes some changes to its business/marketing strategy, it could still potentially realize great profits. It also has the opportunity to lower its prices to try and gain sales since it is already offered at a high price (incentive capability). The SHT has an opportunity as well to actualize the perception that it is a viable solution to the world’s congestion, energy and pollution problems. Finally, Segway has the opportunity to make changes to succeed in a market with no serious direct competitors besides some concepts that have been shown, like the concept Toyota presented at its latest tradeshow. Some threats to Segway are that the SHT is seen as a hazard to pedestrians on sidewalks and that it is too hard to operate. Also, another threat to Segway is the loss of investor backing after more unsuccessful quarterly sales marks. There are few competitors to the SHT. Some